


i like me better when i'm with you

by MajorinMonster



Category: SKAM (France)
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Reunion Fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-06
Updated: 2019-03-06
Packaged: 2019-11-13 01:32:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,078
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18022271
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MajorinMonster/pseuds/MajorinMonster
Summary: By the time Friday morning arrives Lucas has found a total of twelve little drawings hidden about his person, in his bag and in his locker. He keeps them all, safe and secure and tucked into the inside pocket of his jacket, close enough to his heart that he feels stupidly sentimental when he thinks about it.





	i like me better when i'm with you

**Author's Note:**

> its only part way through the week but I’m already convinced skam France is gonna scam us out of our happiness lmao I’ve looked at too many sad raccoons to sit around and do nothing about it so here’s goes nothing. Posting before canon kicks my ass peace out! also technically in this version, because i started it yesterday, chloe hasn't apologised. its not really relevant but just so you know.
> 
> title from "i like me better when im with you" by lauv. the entire album screams lucas and eliott this past couple of weeks i recommend a listen to anyone who wants a little extra pain!
> 
> dedicated to tina! and to everyone who commented on my last fic too, you guys really inspired me to write this!

By the time Friday morning arrives Lucas has found a total of twelve little drawings hidden about his person, in his bag and in his locker. He keeps them all, safe and secure and tucked into the inside pocket of his jacket, close enough to his heart that he feels stupidly sentimental when he thinks about it. 

He is percolating. Filtering through the barrage of information this week has brought with it, dark and broody like the strongest cup of coffee a barista could produce. It keeps you awake long into the night. 

Less than a week ago he sat on a couch, on his  _ bed _ , and cried because every molecule of his body was telling him that Eliott didn’t care, because Yann had walked away from Lucas and taken a chunk of his heart with him. Because he was so scared that every time he walked around a corner at school he would run into a gang of homophobes who took particular delight in telling him how disgusting they found him. In the days since then his fears on two of those topics have been resolved but that first one still haunts him. Eliott, Eliott, Elliot. Eliott feels like an inevitability but Lucas can’t tell if this is a good thing, like how it is inevitable that the sun will rise, or a bad thing, like death. 

Lucas sighs, leaning his head back against his locker as he holds the most recent drawing in his hand, fingers careful. Nothing like the hand that crumpled the note that eventually found its way from Eliott to Lucas to the bin to Mika and right back to Lucas again. This note too is tucked into his pocket with the others, reclaimed. Scrawled across the page of the newest note is a scene set in what appears to be a high school, one lonely raccoon wanders the school’s empty corridors and every now and again he seems to catch a glimpse of an equally carefully drawn hedgehog. The raccoon’s little cartoon heart presses dramatically against the skin of his chest whenever the hedgehog is in view, and the raccoon looks so close to going over until he glances at the phone in his paw and the empty inbox that awaits him. 

Lucas should congratulate Eliott, really. His art has a way of spearing Lucas through the chest, like Eliott had thrown a particularly large pencil with unerring aim, and it had pinned itself into Lucas’s heart.  _ And yet. _ And yet Eliott hasn’t actually come to find him. Not after that initial moment in the cafeteria when Lucas had practically run from him. Though in all honesty Lucas is pretty sure he was entitled to that. Since then he’s seen Eliott only a small handful of times and each time he’s made sure that the noticing wasn’t reciprocated, which is why it’s endlessly frustrating that somehow Eliott has managed to inundate him with notes and he hasn’t noticed one god damned time. Lucas allows a single moment to consider whether Eliott can actually turn into a sneaky little raccoon and use his tiny sneaky hands to slip around unnoticed but he’s pretty sure tiny raccoon Eliott would have a small but passionate army of fans following his cute raccoon self around by midday and that would defeat the purpose entirely. He isn't saying he would be one of those followers… but he isn’t explicitly saying he  _ wouldn’t _ either. 

But that brings him back to the problem at hand. Twelve little notes painstakingly illustrated, the last couple even with colour. That isn’t the work of someone who doesn’t care. It’s time invested, effort spent. 

Lucas is pretty sure that if he were to look in the Pictionary under “mixed message” there would be a photo of this exact moment. 

How do you pair up these notes with the “we’re moving too fast” text, or the fact that Eliott was kissing his supposed ex at a party only days after they’d spent hours kissing each other, memorising every line of each other’s bodies with their lips. There is a piece of this puzzle that he is missing.

“What are you doing?”

Lucas turns his head only far enough to pull a face at Yann as the other boy pauses by Lucas’ locker with a raised eyebrow and crossed arms. He sighs again, dramatically this time, for Yann’s benefit.

“Thinking,” he decides on, “possibly percolating.”

Yann narrows his eyes. “Are you high? Without me?” He sounds unfairly scandalised.

“No. Unless you count being high on the fumes of confusion.” 

“Nope, don’t count that. So I’ll ask again; what are you doing?” 

Wordlessly Lucas hands Yann the drawing and his heart warms as Yann handles it with more care than he has ever seen Yann handle anything with, outside of perhaps Lucas himself.

“Number ten?” He sounds impressed now.

“Twelve.”

“What are you doing?”

Lucas scoffs, “I just showed you-“

“No, Lucas, dude. I mean  _ what are you doing? _ Why aren’t you chasing his ass down?” Yann punches his shoulder with his spare hand, still studying the drawing. “This guy is super into you.” Lucas starts to protest but Yann cuts him off with a frustrated glance. “Don’t get me wrong the way he treated you last week hasn’t been getting him in my good books, but there’s something here right? You like him?” Yann is looking at him with serious eyes, focused intently on Lucas’ face.

_ I love him, _ Lucas doesn’t say.  _ I miss him. _

“Yeah.”

“So…” he draws the syllables out until Lucas rolls his eyes. “What. Are. You. Doing? You’re brooding?” Yann screws his face up to show Lucas exactly what he thinks of his life choices.

“Percolating,” 

“ _ Brooding _ , while this guy is out there drawing fucking sweet ass love notes? You’re balancing the pros and cons, I can see it in your eyes, but what are you really weighing? Past heartbreak vs future happiness? Maybe it won’t work. Maybe you’ll go find him, kiss that pretty face, and then get your heart broken again two weeks down the line but Lucas, can it get worse than this?” Yann gestures to Lucas’ miserable everything. “It could be a happy ending, dude, it could be  _ everything. _ You’re always talking about how there’s a Lucas in every universe who makes a different choice to the one that you make in ours… what if this is the universe where you decide to try? What if, if you don’t make this choice now, no other Lucas ever will?”

Lucas thinks about the dark hole gaping in his chest, a sucking wound with ragged edges that sometimes pulls so hard that all the colour leeches out of the world around him. It itches. Could it get worse than this? Lucas is scared of that answer, to feel worse than this would be to feel the end of the world in his heart. 

_ God _ , he’s being a dramatic little shit. 

But to be happy? To be able to hold Eliott’s hand in public? To be able to stand up on his tip toes and press soft kisses to his eyelids, his cheeks, that perfect mouth? Yann is right. The Lucas of this universe has always prided himself on at least attempting to get what he wants. He was the one who approached Eliott at the vending machine. He was the one who reached out in the rain before their first kiss.

Yann sees something change in Lucas’ eyes before Lucas even realises he’s made a decision. He can see it in his best friend’s face, in the smile that has stretched itself across his mouth and is now mirrored on Lucas’.

“Go get your man, man!” 

Lucas pulls Yann in for a rushed one armed hug, grabbing the note back with his free hand and carefully sticking it into his pocket before he takes off on a tour of the school, moving through corridors like the little raccoon in the drawing.

He tries all the places he thinks Eliott might be, and then the places he thinks he probably won’t be when the first proves fruitless. He’s lucky it’s almost the end of the day and he has a free period for last because the teacher is sick and they couldn’t find a replacement. He’s supposed to go to the library and study but no one will be checking.

Half an hour later he’s run out of classrooms and lab rooms and music rooms. He tried the cafeteria, every bathroom in the building, the courtyard and... and then it hits him. The foyer. The mural. He spins around and half sprints back down the way he came, only slowing when the occasional teacher crosses his path.

The door is closed when he gets there and so he opens it slowly, letting it shut softly behind him. The room is tidy for the most part, with dust sheets covering the furniture close to the mural. 

Eliott is stood with his back to the door, looking down at a colourful array of paints and their respective brushes. There’s a large cardboard plaque to one side with a rough outline of what Lucas assumes must be Eliott’s plan for the wall, and a little more further away, Lucas assumes to reduce the risk of contamination, is a little table of snacks and bottled water. He lingers over the fact that there seems to be enough for two, and that several of the packs of sweets are unopened, and the exact brand and type that Lucas had mentioned in passing that he liked. 

For a moment he can’t breathe. This little detail has struck him senseless and the way the light shines on Eliott’s hair when Lucas looks back towards him is captivating and very distracting and no help whatsoever. Eliott hasn’t noticed him yet so Lucas lets himself have this moment, as his heart tries to break its way out of his chest exactly like how Eliott had drawn the raccoon when he saw the hedgehog. If he were to look down it wouldn’t surprise him to see the outline through his t-shirt, but as it is he has more impressive things to look at, such as Eliott. 

Now that Lucas is here he really has no idea what to do. How to put into words the way that Eliott has changed his life. Sure, he would have come out eventually, down the line, but who knows whether his friendships would have survived the elongated lies. Who knows if  _ he _ would have survived them. The edges of what makes Lucas  _ Lucas _ have been corroding for a while now, like iron exposed to salt water. Maybe there would have been nothing left of him by the time he found the courage. In any case he’ll never know now. In other universes there are versions of him that got the perfect coming out experience but he only lives in his own, where it was messy. On the other hand, in this universe he is closer to his friends and flatmates than ever before. He doesn’t worry as much about the people at school finding out because most of them know.  _ The good with the bad, _ he reminds himself,  _ c’est la vie _ .

He’ll never fully forgive Chloe for taking something that should have been his, but he’s finally willing to accept that it happened and try to see the bright side of it. To move on. Besides, he’s caused his fair share of hurts too. He isn’t innocent. 

Lucas isn’t sure how long he’s been stood here now, introspective and staring at Eliott like a bit of a creep, but he figures it’s been long enough. He takes a couple steps forward, digs his hands into his pockets to anchor himself, then clears his throat. 

Eliott glances over his shoulder, only half interested until he realises who it is. Lucas can see it wash over him, from the way his Adam’s apple bobs sporadically to the way that his fingers clench around the roller in his hand. They stare at each other and it’s awkward but at the same time it isn’t. Lucas bites at his bottom lip, sucking it into his mouth and blushing slightly when Eliott’s gaze drops down to look at his mouth. 

He’s never seen Eliott look so unsure. There are obvious signs of stress, dark circles under his eyes and the nervous tick of his fingers tapping on the wooden handle. His clothes are rumpled but his signature jacket is still present in the background, slung over the arm of a chair. It looks like he hasn’t even brushed his hair properly. 

Lucas sighs quietly, makes up his mind and moves forward. Eliott almost flinches when Lucas nears him but all Lucas does is pick up a spare roller and dip it into the white paint.

“We need a blank slate,” he says quietly, barely above a murmur, as he studies the wall. “Something beautiful belongs here, but first, a new start.”

Eliott watches him carefully. He is so still, a rabbit watching a snake, frozen because he is unsure of if the snake will choose to bite, and of how venomous that bite will be. 

Lucas says nothing more, just dips his roller into the white paint and sets to it, half holding his breath until Eliott quietly moves to join him. They start at opposite ends of the mural and work their way inward until they meet in the middle. The paint is uneven at first, still showing some of the colours of what lies beneath. Slowly but surely this changes, until the wall is as pure as fresh snow.

“We should have cracked a window,” Lucas breaks the silence at last, “I feel half high,” he’s smiling when he meets Eliott’s gaze and he has never been more relieved to see that Eliott is smiling too, a quirk of the mouth, soft to match the look in his eyes. Lucas’ breath catches in his chest and he struggles to inhale for a staggering moment. 

“I miss you,” Eliott says. The words glow in the air between them.

“I'm right here,”

Eliott laughs. The sound is ugly, a little too sharp and self deprecating. 

“I am,” Lucas tries again, moving around Eliott when the other boy tries to avoid his gaze.

“I hurt you.”

Lucas inhales raggedly. “Yeah.” He rubs a smudge of white paint off of his thumb with the edge of his sleeve. “Yeah you did. I don’t like being brushed off, and I really didn’t enjoy watching you kiss Lucille.”

Eliott’s eyes finally dart up to meet his, and they are full of horror. “You…”

“I was at the party. I tried to get to you but…” he purses his lips and gives a half shrug. “Things happened. Then the next thing I know you’re there with her and I’m watching and feeling like the biggest idiot on the planet.” He rubs absentmindedly at his knuckles, accidentally dragging Eliott’s attention there. Eliott hisses and can't seem to be able to stop himself from reaching out, cupping Lucas’ hand in his own so he can study the red marks. 

“Things happened?” He repeats Lucas’ earlier words. 

“No, this was after. Chloe outed me at the party, I tried to leave which is when I saw you and Lucille and then I proceeded to have my ass handed to me-“

“Tell me who,” Eliott is deadly quiet, intense, a seething force made human. “Tell me who and I swear they’ll regret it.”

“-by the wall that I punched,” Lucas finishes with an amused upturn of the mouth, enjoying the way Eliott deflates a little bit like a popped balloon. 

“You shouldn’t have punched a wall, they’re notoriously sturdy,” he strokes a thumb absentmindedly over Lucas’ knuckles, then pulls away quickly when he notices what he’s doing, “I can’t believe Chloe did that. I hate that I wasn’t there for you and I don’t even know how to apologise. I messed everything up. I don’t deserve you,” he clenches his eyes shut and the set of his jaw trembles. “Fuck.” He runs a shaky hand through his hair. “This is why you wouldn’t speak to me in the cafeteria,” Lucas nods. “And why you haven’t been responding to my notes.” 

“I got them all though,” Lucas aches to reach out.

“All thirty of them?” Eliott asks.

“What the fuck,” Lucas’ says softly, slack jawed. Eliott blushes the colour of his shirt, a bright red that somehow looks just as flattering on his face as it does on his body. “I’ve found twelve so far… more importantly though Harry Potter wants his cloak of invisibility back.” Eliott smirks.

“The key is waiting for you to get lost in your own head,” he reveals, a magician with a hat of magic words.  “You go somewhere else, another world. I hope it’s a beautiful place.”

“I like it better when you’re there with me.”

“Lucas,” Eliott’s face is unreadable, “I can’t ask you to forgive what I’ve done. I think everything bad that’s happened to you this past two weeks is my fault,” his gaze flickeres to Lucas’ hand again.

“Chloe wasn’t your fault,” Eliott looks about ready to argue. “Shut up!” He can feel anger churning in his stomach again. “Listen to me! You’re so focused on how I can’t forgive you you’ve forgotten to check in with who actually gets to make that decision. You’re forgiven already Eliott. I don’t know what triggered all this, I won’t pretend to be able to guess. I know it was something I did and while that doesn’t excuse the choices you made we have to admit that we never had the moral high ground here. You cheated on Lucille with me before you ever cheated on me with her.” It’s a thought that has haunted him on more than one night. 

Eliot winces, breaking eye contact again. He looks vaguely queasy. 

“And not everything has been bad! Mika and Mannon know now, and Yann too. It was a little rocky at first but things between us are better than ever. You should have heard the guys, trying to be so subtle and failing spectacularly! But they were so supportive.” Lucas is grinning now, he can feel a light in his heart that has been missing for a while. It’s small, a candle flame, but it’s growing. “And here I am, with you. You, Eliott.  _ God _ . What I feel for you, the impact you’ve had on my entire existence? There are no words. I hope with every inch of my heart that there are no universes where you don’t mind me. Yeah, you really hurt me, I think I hurt you too, though I’m still not sure how. If “us” is a thing you want to try again it’s gonna take some time to get that trust fully back but I  _ want to try.”  _ He blinks tears away, rubbing at his cheek with a huff. “We just need to be honest with each other. That’s all.”

When Lucas looks at Eliott there’s something like awe spread over his face. He looks at Lucas like Lucas just handed him the world but there’s still something unsure in his expression.

Lucas takes a deep breath.

“For example,” he starts, bracing himself, “I lied about my mother.”

Every atom of Eliott seizes, frozen in place. 

“I am in contact with her. She struggles and I can’t do a lot to help her but we text. Sometimes we talk on the phone.” 

Eliott is back to bring unreadable and Lucas has to force himself to continue.

“I love her, Eliott. We don’t always get on but I shouldn’t have lied. I regretted it as soon as it happened, I just thought it would put you more at ease for some reason. I know from experience that she can be a lot to handle and to me she’s worth it, but I’ve never introduced a boyfriend to her before and other than Yann I don’t think anyone else even knows that she’s unwell like that.”

Eliott is already moving before Lucas finishes his last sentence, pressing his soft hands into Lucas’ shoulders and gently pushing until Lucas’ back is pressed against the wall, and he’s looking up into Eliott’s face with wide eyes. “Can I kiss you?”

Lucas reaches up and threads his hands through Eliott’s hair, tugging gently at the soft strands. He presses himself up on his tip toes and brushes his nose gently against Eliott’s.

“I forgive you for lying about your mom,” Eliott breathes into Lucas’ cheek, “I wish you hadn’t felt like you had to but I understand, believe me. There’s still a lot we need to talk about, stuff I need to tell you.” Lucas nods. He can feel Eliott in a line against his body from his thighs to his cheek. They’re pressed so close, one being. 

“Yeah,” the scent of Eliott is intense, a little bit like clean sweat, a little bit like paint. A lot like the vanilla body spray he uses. Lucas loves it. “Stuff. Sure.” He thinks maybe his brain has been unplugged. “ _ Talking _ .”

“Later?” Eliott murmurs, pressing tiny butterfly kisses down from Lucas’ temple to his jaw. He sucks a mark there and Lucas can almost feel it purple as he tugs a little harder at the strands of Eliott’s hair he has curled loosely around his fingers. 

“Later,” he confirms. 

Eliott kisses him and he feels it arcing like electricity from his mouth outwards. Lucas’ hands are still in Eliott’s hair but Eliott’s have ventured down, cupping Lucas’ waist with his warm palms. He touches Lucas like he is something precious and Lucas is so lost in the kiss, in the falling, that it takes him a good few minutes to realise exactly what they’ve done. Eliott jerks backs at his sharp gasp and Lucas peels them away from the wall. There’s a Lucas shaped imprint in the white and Lucas knows without even looking that his entire back and ass are covered in a coat of paint. It’s probably in his hair too. 

“Look,” He laughs, giddy and full of bubbles. A human champagne bottle. “A fresh start,” he drags a hand over his own shoulder, catching some of the paint there and then with his white covered hand he smears it down Eliott’s chest. Eliott is beaming at him, bright and beautiful and almost painful to look at. Almost.

Later, they’ll have to repaint the wall. It looks ridiculous as is and it doesn’t take a genius to figure out why someone might have been pressed back against it, especially if anyone were to see Lucas leaving with Eliott, covered in paint and giggling like an idiot. 

Later, Eliott will take Lucas home. They will kiss at the bus stop waiting for their bus, they will kiss on the bus, to the bemusement of the other passengers. They will kiss pressed up against the door of Eliott’s apartment and on his couch and then on his bed. Eliott will order take out. While they wait for their food he will start to unpack some of the secrets he’s been holding so close to his chest. 

Later, Lucas will realise the power that words have. Without even realising what he’d been doing his attempt to cool any worries that Eliott might have had about Lucas’ mother had backfired spectacularly. And on Eliott’s part he hadn’t used his words to explain his reaction straight away, choosing instead to back off in an attempt to protect his own heart and to avoid bringing any extra stress into Lucas’ life. 

And here, now, just like words had been the trigger for everything to fall apart, words are acting as the glue to bring them back together. When Lucas tells Eliott that he loves him and Eliott whispers the words back, handling them carefully, like they deserve protection, Lucas knows that he made the right choice to offer Eliott his heart again. 

He likes to imagine that somewhere Yann’s Lucas-senses are tingling, that his best friend is feeling smug and like an “I told you so!” is in order. He sincerely hopes that Yann keeps it to himself until Monday though. Lucas has a feeling he and Eliott won’t be separating long enough to look at their phone for the rest of the weekend. 

It’s a good feeling.  


End file.
